Despite dominating the first half of the Iowa Corn 250 between them, neither Tony Kanaan or Helio Castroneves was destined to bring home a victory for Brazil.
The Andretti Green Racing driver's exit was the more dramatic demise, and came as Kanaan - who had led 71-laps before half distance - hauled himself back into contention after being dropped behind a handful of rivals who opted not to pit on the race's fourth caution.
With Dan Wheldon, Hideki Mutoh, Danica Patrick and Scott Dixon - the Kiwi having beaten Kanaan off pit-road - ahead of him, the Brazilian set about trying to regain the lead, or at least be in position to capitalise should the others need a 'splash-n-dash' before the chequer. He had just passed AGR team-mate Patrick for third when the #11 spun and slammed into the turn two SAFER Barrier.
Initial speculation centred on the sort of suspension failure that had put both Bruno Junqueira and Marty Roth out of the race before qualifying, and had accounted for Ed Carpenter in the early stages of the 250-lap event, but Kanaan dismissed the suggestions.
"I just lost it," he confessed, "It's tough to say because I heard someone say that something broke on the car, but I can't really say. I lost it coming into turn one behind Dan and Hideki.
"It's unfortunate because we were having a good race and the Team 7-Eleven car was competitive. I was setting myself up for the end of the race, but turn two has not been a good turn for me at this race."
While Kanaan replicated his exit from the inaugural Iowa Corn 250 in 2007, Castroneves at least made it to the finish, but not before hobbling back to the pits for an emergency tyre change with the chequer in sight.
The Team Penske driver had started on the front row after qualifying was rained out, and didn't have any trouble passing cars in the early going, but, having led a field-high 92 laps, his car started to fade on lap 190. Castroneves had only taken on fuel at the stop, and he was soon radioing the pit to report a deflating right front.
Places were quickly lost on track as the Brazilian slowed, and he was lucky not to have been taken out of the race altogether when Ernesto Viso came close to hitting the rear of the slowing Penske entry. The resulting 14th place finish was Castroneves' first non-top five this season, and leaves him some 48 points behind Dixon in the standings.
"The car was great, and we led the most laps, but, after our final pit-stop, I felt a change in the way the car was handling and thought we might have a tyre problem," he revealed, "The guys looked into it, and we were losing pressure slowly.
"I'm not sure if I ran over a piece of debris from the previous crash or what, but we decided to take a chance and stay out for the final 20 laps to see if we could make it. Unfortunately, the car became too much to handle, and we had to stop for new tyres. Today just wasn't our day."
